Smith’s abrupt changes in tempo, volume, and instrumentation are alternately inspiring and disorienting.

While their recorded output has still not quite caught up to their prowess as a live band, that moment is likely right around the corner; in the meantime, this album is more than good enough to make that wait worthwhile.

For an album about all the bad things that can happen to us, it sounds pretty damn good.

A Healthy Distrust’s production and wordplay have improved to such a large degree that it’s hard to believe that it could happen again on the next outing.

The excessive genre-bending of their debut has been exchanged for a dilettantism honed to a much sharper point.

iT is the most focused art the Projectors have ever produced.

In Colour trades much of the punch from their first self-titled full-length for a more tender (is that even possible?) and reflective muse.

Strongly, boringly decent.

The four new Magnetic Fields tracks, while good, add little more to Merritt’s considerable repertoire than a few catchy melodies, with scarcely a clever line to boast.

The inferior quality of the covers belies the excellence of American IV’s originals.

Last Night sacrifices the unified statement of Someday for a more varied, deliriously fun lack of coherency.

A number of songs crumple under the weight of the album’s ambition.... Regardless, Amore del Tropico is a fine, fine record: a lively, lovely concept album that bridges the gap between Nick Cave and Calexico.

By turns thrilling, gratifying, and hideous.

Clearly, Gold Chains has a lot to say and a lot to prove, and possesses the means to do so. What this requires is some focus.

<A HREF="http://www.stylusmagazine.com/review.php?ID=1410" TARGET="_blank">People are claiming The Rapture are geniuses, saviours and innovators but the simple truth is that they aren&#146;t.</A> [Review 1, score=70] <A HREF="http://www.stylusmagazine.com/review.php?ID=1411" TARGET="_blank">One hates to frown on a band&#146;s ambition, but you may find yourself hoping that next time out the band plays to their strengths the whole way through.</A> [Review 2, score=75]

Musically there&#146;s not enough variation to keep things interesting throughout.</A>[Note: Score listed is an average of two separate reviews: a <A HREF="http://www.stylusmagazine.com/musicreviews/grandaddy-sumday2.shtml" TARGET="_blank">61</A> and an <A HREF="http://www.stylusmagazine.com/musicreviews/grandaddy-sumday1.shtml" TARGET="_blank">85</A>]

As sumptuous and sublime as much of Hypnotic Underworld is, Ghost tend to noodle too long.

It could have been much more, but for what it is -- a blissful summer excursion -- L' Avventura is delicately delightful.

More inventive song writing and a less antagonistic stance could have helped Sigur Ros create something as equally stirring as their previous album.

Given the genre-splicing we witnessed on 10,000 Hz Legend, Talkie Walkie sometimes seems like white-bread Air, like a fractured spin-off of Moon Safari.

She doesn’t attempt to emulate the pedantic attention to detail of Kevin Shields, largely avoiding the dreamlike wooziness of Loveless, but rather builds on the cathartic emotional impact that feedback and noise can lend to melancholic melodies.

But for all of the good things that can be said about the first half of the record, the second half misses the very things that made both of the previous two records such conflicted masterpieces.

The Notwist are obviously talented enough to keep me guessing if they wanted to. They just don't. They are quite happy making simple pop songs, albeit with complex ingredients.

The relentlessness of the pillaging becomes one of the album&#146;s virtues&#151;each song wildly varies from the next, revealing thirty-five minutes of noise and pop that extends far beyond the surface into a slowly decaying singalong monster.

The weak point of the disc... is the songwriting.... But if you&#146;re in it for pure sonic pleasure, you&#146;re in the right place.

Unlike the playgrounds inhabited by those chillout bands--and other post-Air types, for that matter--the rhythms aren’t just here to keep time. Instead, they add texture and purpose, swinging from chunky bass lines to dub soundscapes.

This record is packed with deceptively simple melodies -- often aping established pop forms and the singer&#146;s usual array of influences -- that are nearly irresistible because of the detail that Momus and Talaga infuse into each of his songs.

Review 1: <A HREF="http://www.stylusmagazine.com/review.php?ID=1418" TARGET="_blank">This is what they do- they don’t ape other bands. They ape pop music. And they do it better than any other band right now.</A> [score=80]; Review 2: <A HREF="http://www.stylusmagazine.com/review.php?ID=1419" TARGET="_blank">33 minutes and 34 seconds of the SAME album!</A> [score=65]